6. The âpéconception of number is feebly developed in its application to inanimate objects, which often have no grammatical plurals. The inclusive and exclusive plurals are used in the first person.
7. The genius of the language is _holophrastic_--that is, its effort is to express the relationship of several ideas by combining them in one word. This is displayed: 1, in nominal themes, by _polysynthesis_, by which several such themes are welded into one, according to fixed laws of elision and euphony; and 2, by _incorporation_, where the object (or a pronoun representing it) and the subject are united with the verb, forming the so-called "transitions," or "objective conjugations."
8. There is no relative pronoun, so that the relation of minor to major clauses is left to be indicated either by position or the offices of a simple connective.
9. The language of both sexes is identical, those differences of speech between the males and females, so frequently observed in other American tongues, finding no place in the Algonkin.
10. No independent verb-substantive is found, and, as might be anticipated, no means of predicating existence apart from quality and attribute.
Two slightly different dialects prevailed among the Delawares themselves, the one spoken by the Unami and Unalachtgo, the other by the Minsi. The former is stated by the Moravian missionaries to have had an uncommonly soft and pleasant sound to the ear[158], and William Penn made the same remark. It was also considered to be the purer and more elegant dialect, and was preferred by the missionaries as the vehicle for their translations.
The Minsi was harsher and more difficult to learn, but would seem to have been the more archaic branch, as it is stated to be a key to the other, and to preserve many words in their integrity and original form, which in the Unami were abbreviated or altogether dropped. The Minsi dialect was closely akin to the Mohegan.
How far the separation of the Delaware dialects had extended may be judged from the subjoined list of words. They are selected, as showing the greatest variation, from a list of over one hundred, prepared by Mr. Heckewelder for the American Philosophical Society, and preserved in MS. in its library.